Sound water management is key to sustaining
the future of both humanity and the environment. It is closely linked
to the internationally-agreed development goals. Properly harnessed
and utilized, water becomes an indispensable resource for development;
squandered and abused it becomes a source of human suffering.

An adequate freshwater supply is required to maintain the viability
of life-supporting ecosystems. Polluting water not only damages ecosystems,
but renders water unsafe for drinking, and unsafe drinking water is,
on a global scale, currently the single most important environment-related
health threat. Irrigation has significantly improved crop yields, but
in many areas, it has lead to serious environmental degradation –
such as salinization and the depletion and contamination of aquifers
– which in turn reduces the amount of food that can be produced.
Negative environmental impacts such as these soon translate into poor
human health and economic loss. One of the main global challenges to
sustainable development is, therefore, to balance water consumption
for economic and social development as well as for ecosystem functions
and services.

Although the water outlook is still too often one of degradation and
depletion, a crisis is not inevitable. UNEP’s Executive Director
has described 2003 as “a year where the world has more than ever
come to understand that cooperation over water is something like a peace
policy for the 21st century.” Coupled with this, more governments
and other freshwater stakeholders are recognizing that an approach that
integrates the protection of aquatic and terrestrial ecosystems within
the context of sustainable development is the way forward to improved
water supply and sanitation, food production, human settlements, and
other priority issues. In many parts of the world, we are far from achieving
efficient and effective management of the limited amount of freshwater
that is available on our planet. And the longer we wait to change prevalent
patterns of water use, the more difficult and expensive it will be to
achieve the MDGs and WSSD targets for sustainable environmental, social
and economic development, including poverty eradication.

A broad range of policy instruments, management techniques and longstanding
as well as innovative technologies are at our disposal. Firm commitments
by political leaders and decision-makers are needed to implement prioritized
action plans incorporating water management to achieve the relevant
goals and targets at different levels: local, basin, national, transboundary,
regional and/or global. To do so, countries must strengthen institutions
and legal frameworks, secure sufficient financial resources, build capacities
in managing water resources and equitably involve all stakeholders –
including women – in the design and implementation of integrated
water resource management plans and frameworks.

More than a billion people still live in a world of want in terms of
water and sanitation and their numbers are still increasing. Meeting
this water challenge is vital to moving toward a world where people
are “free from want” as underlined in the Millennium Declaration
in 2000. The 2003 International Year of Freshwater has re-emphasized
the urgency behind this commitment by the world leaders at the Millennium
Summit. Achieving the agreed goals and targets requires the urgent and
concerted attention of freshwater stakeholders at all levels –
today.